Poetry Codex

Restoration & Augustan

Jane Barker

1652–1732

Jane Barker (1652–1732) was an English poet and novelist, born at Blatherwycke in Northamptonshire and later associated with Wilsthorpe in Lincolnshire. She was a Catholic and a Jacobite, and followed the exiled James II to the court at Saint-Germain in France after 1688, returning to England in the early eighteenth century.

Her first printed verse appeared as Part I of Poetical Recreations (1688), a miscellany of epistles, songs, odes and elegies, several of them addressed to friends and to her brother, with a second part by other hands. She later published further poems and the prose fictions Love Intrigues (1713), Exilius (1715) and A Patch-Work Screen for the Ladies (1723).

Poems (52)

  1. An Invitation to my Friends at Cambridge
  2. To Mr. HILL, on his Verses to the Dutchess of YORK, when she was at Cambridge
  3. To my Cousin Mr. E. F. on his Excellent PAINTING
  4. To my Reverend Friend Mr. H—. on his Presenting me The Reasonableness of Christianity, and The History of King CHARLES the First, &c
  5. To Mr. G. P. my Adopted Brother; on the nigh approach of his Nuptials
  6. A VIRGIN LIFE
  7. To my Friend EXILLUS, on his persuading me to Marry Old Damon
  8. To Dr. R. S. my indifferent Lover, who complain'd of my Indifferency
  9. On the DEATH of my Dear Friend and Play-fellow, Mrs E. D. having Dream'd the night before I heard thereof, that I had lost a Pearl
  10. The Prospect of a LANDSKIP, Beginning with a GROVE
  11. Sitting by a Rivulet
  12. A HILL
  13. To Sir F. W. presenting him Cowley's first Works
  14. To Ovid's HEROINES in his Epistles
  15. To my Honourable Unkle Colonel C— after his Return into the Low-Countries
  16. On the Apothecary's Filing my Bills amongst the Doctors
  17. To my Unkind STREPHON
  18. To my Friend Mr. S. L. ON HIS Receiving the Name of Little Tom King
  19. Necessity of Fate
  20. To my Honoured Friend, Mr. E. S—
  21. On my Mother and my Lady W—. who both lay sick at the same time under the Hands of Dr. Paman
  22. In Commendation of the Female Sex. Out of SCIPINA
  23. To my BROTHER, whilst he was in France
  24. On the DEATH of my Brother
  25. On the same. A Pindarique ODE
  26. Part of the XIX. PSALM
  27. Coming from—in a Dark Night
  28. To my Dear Cousin Mrs. M. T. after the Death of her Husband and Son
  29. TO MY Young Lover
  30. TO MY Young Lover ON HIS VOW
  31. TO MY Young Lover. A SONG
  32. To my Unkind Friend, Little Tom King
  33. A Second EPISTLE. To my Honoured Friend Mr. E. S
  34. A PASTORAL DIALOGUE Betwixt Two Shepherd Boys
  35. To Mr. C. B. On his Incomparable SINGING
  36. THE COMPLAINT
  37. A SONG in SCIPINA
  38. A SONG
  39. A SONG
  40. A SONG
  41. A Bachanalian SONG
  42. An ODE
  43. Absence for a Time
  44. Parting with—
  45. THE Anchorite IN SCIPINA
  46. Iane, Nan, and Frank, their Farewell to Captain C. going to Sea
  47. To her Lovers Complaint. A SONG
  48. To my Adopted BROTHER, Mr. G. P. On my frequent Writing to Him
  49. To my Friends against POETRY
  50. TO THE Importunate ADDRESS OF POETRY
  51. A Farewell to POETRY, WITH A Long Digression on ANATOMY
  52. On the DEATH of my Brother. A SONNET

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